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John Markoff

Technology & Science Reporter

John Markoff is currently researching a biography of Stewart Brand, the creator of the Whole Earth Catalog. He will be a research affiliate at Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences in 2018-2019, participating in projects focusing on the future of work and artificial intelligence. In 2017-18 he was Berggruen Fellow at CASBS. In 2017 he joined the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif., as a staff historian. Previously he was a reporter at the The New York Times, beginning in March 1988 as the paper’s national computer writer. He moved to Silicon Valley to write about technology in 1992. Prior to joining the Times, he worked for The San Francisco Examiner from 1985 to 1988. He reported for the New York Times Science Section from 2010 through 2015. He returned to the Business Section to cover Silicon Valley in 2016 and retired from the paper in December of 2016.

Markoff has written about technology and science since 1977. He reported on technology and the defense industry for The Pacific News Service in San Francisco from 1977 to 1981; he was a reporter at Infoworld from 1981 to 1983; he was the West Coast editor for Byte Magazine from 1984 to 1985 and wrote a column on personal computers for The San Jose Mercury from 1983 to 1985.

The Times nominated him for a Pulitzer Prize in 1995, 1998 and 2000. The San Francisco Examiner nominated him for a Pulitzer in 1987. In 2005, with a group of Times reporters, he received the Loeb Award for business journalism. In 2007 he shared the Society of American Business Editors and Writers Breaking News award. In 2013 he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting as part of a New York Times project on labor and automation.

Markoff is the co-author of “The High Cost of High Tech,” published in 1985 by Harper & Row. He wrote “Cyberpunk: Outlaws and Hackers on the Computer Frontier” with Katie Hafner, which was published in 1991 by Simon & Schuster. In January of 1996 Hyperion published “Takedown: The Pursuit and Capture of America’s Most Wanted Computer Outlaw,” which he co-authored with Tsutomu Shimomura. “What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture shaped the Personal Computer Industry,” was published in 2005 by Viking Books. “Machines of Loving Grace: The Quest for Common Ground Between Humans and Robots,” was published in August of 2015 by HarperCollins Ecco. His most recent book is Machines of Loving Grace: The Quest for Common Ground Between Humans and Robots.

Related Video Conversations

Fifty years ago the Whole Earth Catalog burst onto the cultural scene and helped set in motion waves of innovation that reverberated through the San Francisco Bay Area and the rest of America – and that continue to this day. The one-and-only Stewart Brand was the creative force behind that unique media publication and cultural phenomenon and we’re honored that he talked about the Whole Earth’s intellectual and entrepreneurial legacy at our What’s Now: San Francisco. He also talked the positive side of having to solve a civilizational-scale problem like climate change and why he believes we will solve it. The event also featured a dozen remarkable people give moving testimonials about the legacy of the catalog and Stewart. Be sure to watch this unforgettable evening.

Drastic improvements in automation and artificial intelligence over the last decade or so, and wary comments from high-profile tech industry tycoons like Elon Musk and Bill Gates, have stirred up anxieties that may soon morph into full-blown panic. Will robots take all the jobs? Veteran New York Times technology writer John Markoff admits to having contributed to rising concerns in recent years, but says he now thinks humans will do just fine.